2,885 research outputs found
Multipath streaming: fundamental limits and efficient algorithms
We investigate streaming over multiple links. A file is split into small
units called chunks that may be requested on the various links according to
some policy, and received after some random delay. After a start-up time called
pre-buffering time, received chunks are played at a fixed speed. There is
starvation if the chunk to be played has not yet arrived. We provide lower
bounds (fundamental limits) on the starvation probability of any policy. We
further propose simple, order-optimal policies that require no feedback. For
general delay distributions, we provide tractable upper bounds for the
starvation probability of the proposed policies, allowing to select the
pre-buffering time appropriately. We specialize our results to: (i) links that
employ CSMA or opportunistic scheduling at the packet level, (ii) links shared
with a primary user (iii) links that use fair rate sharing at the flow level.
We consider a generic model so that our results give insight into the design
and performance of media streaming over (a) wired networks with several paths
between the source and destination, (b) wireless networks featuring spectrum
aggregation and (c) multi-homed wireless networks.Comment: 24 page
Distributed Rate Allocation Policies for Multi-Homed Video Streaming over Heterogeneous Access Networks
We consider the problem of rate allocation among multiple simultaneous video
streams sharing multiple heterogeneous access networks. We develop and evaluate
an analytical framework for optimal rate allocation based on observed available
bit rate (ABR) and round-trip time (RTT) over each access network and video
distortion-rate (DR) characteristics. The rate allocation is formulated as a
convex optimization problem that minimizes the total expected distortion of all
video streams. We present a distributed approximation of its solution and
compare its performance against H-infinity optimal control and two heuristic
schemes based on TCP-style additive-increase-multiplicative decrease (AIMD)
principles. The various rate allocation schemes are evaluated in simulations of
multiple high-definition (HD) video streams sharing multiple access networks.
Our results demonstrate that, in comparison with heuristic AIMD-based schemes,
both media-aware allocation and H-infinity optimal control benefit from
proactive congestion avoidance and reduce the average packet loss rate from 45%
to below 2%. Improvement in average received video quality ranges between 1.5
to 10.7 dB in PSNR for various background traffic loads and video playout
deadlines. Media-aware allocation further exploits its knowledge of the video
DR characteristics to achieve a more balanced video quality among all streams.Comment: 12 pages, 22 figure
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